Slitherine

PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Posted: Thu Feb 06, 2020 12:34 pm

by calmhatchery

PACIFIC GENERAL for PzC 2
I know that many peoples know about this old game. But I decided to bring this topic closer to those who do not know this game and to developers as a template for a future add-on for PZc 2.
It is funny that we can still buy it for very little cash. (something about 5 EUR) on GOG. com. I tried this and this is amazing game. Of course the graphic is old but the playability is so good as Panzer Corps.
I think this is a good pattern to put this into PZc 2 in the future.
here link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-w_vtEgKgUs&t=252s

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Posted: Thu Feb 06, 2020 12:48 pm

by MickMannock

Personally, I found Pacific General quite dull. The dense jungle makes for a quite static gameplay. Sure, you had the island invasions and stuff, but the ground combat was to a great extent an infantry meat grinder. Of all the possible DLC options for Panzer Corps 2, I'd put the Pacific theatre at the bottom of the list.

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Personally, I found Pacific General quite dull. The dense jungle makes for a quite static gameplay. Sure, you had the island invasions and stuff, but the ground combat was to a great extent an infantry meat grinder. Of all the possible DLC options for Panzer Corps 2, I'd put the Pacific theatre at the bottom of the list.

Just for fun and hypothetically speaking....

Where on such a list would you put the Spanish Civil War?
Or an entirely fictional campaign, such as Afrika Korps going all the way to India or something?

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Personally, I found Pacific General quite dull. The dense jungle makes for a quite static gameplay. Sure, you had the island invasions and stuff, but the ground combat was to a great extent an infantry meat grinder. Of all the possible DLC options for Panzer Corps 2, I'd put the Pacific theatre at the bottom of the list.

Just for fun and hypothetically speaking....

Where on such a list would you put the Spanish Civil War?
Or an entirely fictional campaign, such as Afrika Korps going all the way to India or something?

I'll go all the way and make a full list just for the heck of it:

1. A grand campaign featuring the German side, pretty much what you made for Panzer Corps, but perhaps with more historical background, tying into famous battles (loved how you incorporated real historical figures into the scenarios, like Freyberg on Crete for example). I think you should do it in the very same mold as you did for the previous game but I think you should expand the Barbarossa campaign, so that you have one for DLC for Army Group North, one for AGC and one for AGS.
2. For me, there isn't really a #2, cause #1 is such a huge deal.
3. Afrika-campaign, though I'd prefer that it'd have the same structure as the Grand campaign had for the other fronts.
4. British European campaign starting in France 1940 (also same structure as the Grand campaign for the Germans).
5. US European campaign, starting with operation Torch (same structure as above)
6. Soviet campaign
7. Italian campaign
8. Spanish civil war campaign (this campaign could very well have the same mold as the Grand campaign and work as a prelude to the Poland campaign for the Germans (and even the Italians and Soviets too, where, if you are successful you earn an elite unit (Mölders or Galland for the Germans for example) that carries over to first DLC campaign scenario when the "real" war starts), and in that case this campaign could move up to #4)
9. The pacific (regardless of which nation we are talking about). And if you would do a Pacific campaign, I think a lot of thought needs to go into the naval side of things, cause including naval aspects of the campaign would make it a bit more interesting than otherwise.

As for all the "what if:s", that's a bit more difficult. I like it when you follow the actual flow of the war. I loved playing the defensive scenarios for the Germans on the eastern front in 44/45 in the previous game. On the other hand, I understand that a lot of players probably feel they want to make an impact, so they can change the outcome of the war. And I assume it would be too expensive to make different versions of the campaigns, historical and non-historical. But if I personally had to chose one over the other, I'd prefer the historical path. That's not to say I didn't enjoy the Afrika korps expansion for Panzer Corps which took us into a few what if-scenarios at the end (if I remember correctly).

All in all, my wish is that you focus on historical accuracy and by telling a tale, increasing the immersion when I delve into the campaign. I think that is possible with a bit more elaborate scenario descriptions, scenario goals that can change during a scenario and with historical "heroes" (instead of random ones).

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Posted: Fri Feb 07, 2020 11:09 am

by nexusno2000

A WW2 Italian campaign sounds very exciting and challenging!

Also I fondly remember SCW scenarios (and Winter War) from old PG game.

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Posted: Fri Feb 07, 2020 11:12 am

by calmhatchery

I would like t osee in the future also Pacific theatre by Japanese forces like in old timer Pacific general

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Personally, I found Pacific General quite dull. The dense jungle makes for a quite static gameplay. Sure, you had the island invasions and stuff, but the ground combat was to a great extent an infantry meat grinder. Of all the possible DLC options for Panzer Corps 2, I'd put the Pacific theatre at the bottom of the list.

Just for fun and hypothetically speaking....

Where on such a list would you put the Spanish Civil War?
Or an entirely fictional campaign, such as Afrika Korps going all the way to India or something?

I would rate an Allied or Japanese campaign in the Pacific highly on my personal list. Spanish Civil War would be interesting and I love me some Afrika Korps. I have heard numerous people say that the PZC or hex based war games like this doesn't "lend itself well" to the Pacific theater but I would love to see somebody give it another go. I may buy Pacific General from GOG just to get my Pacific theater fix but it'd be cool to see something new. I am also surprised that nobody made a Pacific theater mod for PZC1.

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Personally, I found Pacific General quite dull. The dense jungle makes for a quite static gameplay. Sure, you had the island invasions and stuff, but the ground combat was to a great extent an infantry meat grinder. Of all the possible DLC options for Panzer Corps 2, I'd put the Pacific theatre at the bottom of the list.

Just for fun and hypothetically speaking....

Where on such a list would you put the Spanish Civil War?
Or an entirely fictional campaign, such as Afrika Korps going all the way to India or something?

Part of what makes the European theater of WW2 so interesting is the rapidly escalating use of technology. That's quite different from a sticks and stones infantry war with some artillery thrown in (e.g. WW1, Spain, Japan vs. China, Italy vs. Ethiopia). It would be a challenge to make these wars interesting. Along similar lines, PzC doesn't really work for guerrilla type wars or civil wars that use mostly irregular forces. That's most of the conflicts in the 20th century.

Pacific could be interesting. The trouble with navy wars though is low replay value since when you know where the enemy is and what they've got you're guaranteed a win. If the Japanese had known what the USA brought to Midway and where it was, they would have won hands down. If the USA knew that they knew, the USA would have fled. And so on. One-sided victories or strategic retreats aren't exactly the making of a fun game.

Perhaps one way is to have more ahistorical paths. Japan taking on Russia instead of the USA, for example.

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Posted: Sat Feb 08, 2020 1:51 am

by Kerensky

Interesting feedback from everyone. We'll absolutely take some notes. Though it seems pretty clear the players overwhelming want more 'campaign'. What exactly that entails seems to just come down to personal preferences.

Part of what makes the European theater of WW2 so interesting is the rapidly escalating use of technology. That's quite different from a sticks and stones infantry war with some artillery thrown in (e.g. WW1, Spain, Japan vs. China, Italy vs. Ethiopia). It would be a challenge to make these wars interesting. Along similar lines, PzC doesn't really work for guerrilla type wars or civil wars that use mostly irregular forces. That's most of the conflicts in the 20th century.

Pacific could be interesting. The trouble with navy wars though is low replay value since when you know where the enemy is and what they've got you're guaranteed a win. If the Japanese had known what the USA brought to Midway and where it was, they would have won hands down. If the USA knew that they knew, the USA would have fled. And so on. One-sided victories or strategic retreats aren't exactly the making of a fun game.

Perhaps one way is to have more ahistorical paths. Japan taking on Russia instead of the USA, for example.

Good point on the influence of technology on gameplay. On a personal note, this is why I don't really enjoy Napoleonic games compared to WW2 games.
As for it being a 'challenge' to make them interesting... I see no reason to personally fear such a challenge. Interesting design shouldn't be problematic... but making sure it's still 'fun' while respective of history... yea that is going to be a challenge.

As for pre-knowledge of enemy dispositions, it's a common issue you've raised. For example as part of being a 'negative' against recon, because they lose that role of intelligence gathering. As it is, recon cars provide so much other non-combat utility, it's actually a horrible mistake NOT to use them, so I think Panzer Corps 2 has that problem nailed.

As for enemy disposition specifically. This is a little more tricky. Because adding such variance to scenarios dramatically scales up the difficulty of the content. If a player struggles to beat a scenario, they can replay it and have an 'advantage' in at least now having a better idea what they are up against. But if the next time the play, the enemy has completely shuffled their forces... it's going to feel really bad for that player to again struggle and fail.

So unfortunately it's not as easy as 'adding randomizing elements to the enemy to increase replayability'.

But you know what is cool about Panzer Corps 2? Unlike the original game, we actually have the power to do this. We can shuffle not only position, but even composition of enemy forces. It's crazy powerful, and extremely experimental. But it's actually possible now.

And we'll experiment with it... but that doesn't mean wholesale injection of this concept into every piece of content.

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Posted: Sat Feb 08, 2020 5:33 am

by proline

Yeah, I wasn't suggesting the problem could be overcome by randomization, especially for naval combat. Foreknowledge is a bigger problem for the navy than land battles because naval battles take place at range. Whereas in land battles even if you know what your enemy has, you still have to fight them giving them a chance to fight you a bit. With navy, if you know where they are and where they are going, you can just pick them off from a distance and stay out of their way. Solving this by randomization would have all the disadvantages you describe on top of ruining the historical aspect of the game. Defending Pearl Harbor against a Japanese attack from the south just wouldn't be right.

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Solving this by randomization would have all the disadvantages you describe on top of ruining the historical aspect of the game. Defending Pearl Harbor against a Japanese attack from the south just wouldn't be right.

I don't think anyone would use such a specific battle to throw randomization into.

I think it might be more useful in a Battle for Bzura type scenario. In the original GC, there are waves of enemies that attack several bridgeheads. But it is fully scripted, meaning you could 'learn' or decipher when a particular wave would reach a particular crossing.
Randomization can make it impossible to have pre-knowledge of which bridgehead will be attacked by what wave of enemies. So you must perform proper recon to detect where the threat is, and then you can respond to it.

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Interesting feedback from everyone. We'll absolutely take some notes. Though it seems pretty clear the players overwhelming want more 'campaign'. What exactly that entails seems to just come down to personal preferences.

Part of what makes the European theater of WW2 so interesting is the rapidly escalating use of technology. That's quite different from a sticks and stones infantry war with some artillery thrown in (e.g. WW1, Spain, Japan vs. China, Italy vs. Ethiopia). It would be a challenge to make these wars interesting. Along similar lines, PzC doesn't really work for guerrilla type wars or civil wars that use mostly irregular forces. That's most of the conflicts in the 20th century.

Pacific could be interesting. The trouble with navy wars though is low replay value since when you know where the enemy is and what they've got you're guaranteed a win. If the Japanese had known what the USA brought to Midway and where it was, they would have won hands down. If the USA knew that they knew, the USA would have fled. And so on. One-sided victories or strategic retreats aren't exactly the making of a fun game.

Perhaps one way is to have more ahistorical paths. Japan taking on Russia instead of the USA, for example.

Good point on the influence of technology on gameplay.

I think the differences in technology adds a great deal of replay appeal. I am an old grognard, I have been playing wargames since the 70s when we had only board games like Panzerblitz and Trireme or miniatures rules. Trireme (Roman era naval battles) was a lot of fun because there were a lot of ship types and strategies to employ.

Napoleonic times, well Wellington said "they came at us the same old way, and we beat them the same old way." And that pretty much describes ground warfare up until technology added mobility. WW2 is particularly interesting because we went from a BT7 to a Iosef Stalin, there was so much change over a short period of time.

A Korean War campaign would pretty much see the same equipment beginning and end. And you get a good first play through, but after that... Pacific to me is a little like that. I think it lends itself to a strategic level - what islands do you hop, where do you place airbases, where do you send your subs. On the tactical level gets a little samey. The terrain is all volcanic archipelagos.

Western Theater, you have a lot of variations in terrain and weather conditions. Adds to replayability, changing out units. For tactical level combat, middle of last century Europe is the sweet spot, terrain as much as technology.

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Posted: Tue Feb 18, 2020 8:35 pm

by Infierno

I love the idea of DLC campaigns for lesser explored conflicts, especially the Korean War. It could be a challenge to make them interesting without going fully into the realm of fantasy stories (but then again, PC1 had a Wehrmacht invasion of the United States GC branch...), but the results could be awesome.

Maybe I'm being a bit cynical and overly analytic, but I disagree about rapidly changing technology being the most interesting aspect of WWII in Europe. The Germans began rapidly updating tank designs when it became apparent that they were fighting a war that sheer numbers could not win them, so they banked on bigger, better armor being the difference maker. In reality, their rapid "improvements" did more to hinder their war effort than stave back the Soviets.

I know we're talking about a game, not real life, but what makes XYZ General/Corps games interesting to me is the challenge of trying to get the most out of my core units while preserving them. A steady trickle of new technology helps spice up new missions, but it's hardly a requirement if the campaign is well-designed.

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Posted: Thu Feb 20, 2020 2:52 pm

by cicciopastic

Just for fun and hypothetically speaking....

Where on such a list would you put the Spanish Civil War?
Or an entirely fictional campaign, such as Afrika Korps going all the way to India or something?

I think there is a large portion of us awaiting for a more strategic level (see the huge success mcguba battlefield mod had).

Re: PACIFIC GENERAL for PZc 2

Where on such a list would you put the Spanish Civil War?
Or an entirely fictional campaign, such as Afrika Korps going all the way to India or something?

The fictional campaigns based on things like your referenced Afrika Korps campaign, an American Invasion campaign, etc. were things I was wanting and sorely missed in PzC 1. Additionally, the utter failure of my historic campaigns despite succeeding in the missions really chapped my ass, too. I was thinking that because I was DEEP into Moscow that I'd be able to conquer Russia and see what happened next...but nope. We had to turn 'er back around for whatever reason and continue this retreat despite my dudes being all xp'ed out, buffed up with replacements, and so on.

A Pacific Campaign would be beautiful. We never got to futz with the Imperial Japanese the first go around.

Spain would be intriguing af.

A Korean War being explored through PzC 2 would be amazing. The tech isn't worlds different and seems like it'd be a blast with the base game you've developed.